Have you ever found a special guy/girl you thought was the person of your dreams but it turned out to be a horrible nightmare of a situation that left you wondering how you could have been so wrong while picking up what's left of your belongings that he/she lit on fire and dumped on the sidewalk next to the Mcdonalds on Shields and Blackstone? The one with the Golden Arches? No?
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That might have been a little too specific but you get the gist. We have all had a bad breakup or lived through a horrible relationship that we knew was bad but we convinced ourselves it would all work out in time. It's a badge of life; something that we all unfortunately must go through. Our family and friends tried to warn us but we didn't listen and we're left picking up the pieces and licking our wounds yet all the wiser for the next person the strolls on by.
I'm currently in that same exact situation except it's not with a special someone; the stakes may actually be much higher than a simple romantic relationship. My career is on the line here, the career I worked hard for, bled for, could potentially end because of one rotten pit-stop in Alberta. The Calgary Flames and I are breaking up...And it's getting ugly.
I know what you're thinking. "But Wyatt, things were going so well." Yeah, they were AT FIRST. I started the season going 6-0-1 in my first seven starts including my best game of my career against the LA Kings where i posted a .900 save percentage with 27 saves on 30 shots. I was feeling great, looking great (obviously), and got a sponsorship with Brian's goalie gear which upped my on-ice fashion tremendously. Looking good is half the battle. But everything started to change when I shaved my trademark mullet...
With my new found success, I felt like I needed to change things up to make myself look more mature and grow into a newer, wiser version of myself so I chopped the lettuce. Of course, looking back now I realize I jumped the gun a tad by changing things up after a solid 7 game streak. I probably should have let a full season play out before I went berserk but hey, my do-first-think-later attitude got me this far. In my opinion, after I shaved the mullet my teammates started to drastically play worse in front of me. We fell into a slump and struggled to win games, but I didn't put too much stock into it because slumps happen to everyone. You grip the stick a little tighter until you get your lucky break and the floodgates to success open up once again. Unless of course you're the Buffalo Sabres but that's a blog for another time.
But the slump never went away. We continued to struggle mightily as a team and I was starting to develop unbearable back pain from carrying the entire roster every night. My anger and frustration was piling up until eventually I began to lash out. The video below might help explain; look at this garbage.
Needless to say, I was looking for ways to get out of my contract, the only thing stopping me was my pride. I never wanted to be that guy who never seems happy and is always complaining about anything and everything. That was until I left a meeting with my therapist who explained to me that I am, without a shadow of a doubt, the 100% embodiment of that guy. What a shock that was; talk about a revelation.
My therapist offered me some much needed advise and urged me to try it out in my next game against the Colorado Avalanche. She said to 'control my emotions' and to 'take everything one step at a time' and also begged me to 'not fight the other goalie just because he's having a better game than you'. Sounded insane to me. I wondered if she was actually the crazy one for a moment there but I decided to give her advise a try. It worked! ...For the first period, and then things went downhill. I wouldn't even say downhill because that implies a gradual yet controlled decline, it jumped off of the steepest cliff and painfully slammed against the cliff a few times on the way down. Observe.
Yeah, not pretty. I think it's time to pack my things and sneak away into the night and find a new team. I'm still mulling it over because there's only a few more games left in the season and who knows what could happen but it looks...well, not good. While it's in my nature to entirely blame this on the front office and my teammates, i'm going to be a big man and take some responsibility.
Here goes: I shouldn't have shaved my mullet so early into the season. There. That's it.
Anyway, the mullet is back and so am I. Check out #TheNextStop out on https://www.twitch.tv/wahvalanche tonight.
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